


The Ghost Who Loved Potted Plants

by misura



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F, Ghost Hunters, Ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-30
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-06-05 09:49:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6700054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's all fun and ghosts, until someone pulls out a gun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ghost Who Loved Potted Plants

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sumi/gifts).



_Poltergeist, my ass,_ Julie thought, dodging another bullet.

Ghost hunters were not, as a rule, trained to survive people shooting at them, but if you looked at it in a certain way - _a very_ stupid _way_ , dodging bullets was not that different from dodging, say, potted plants. _Very, very small potted plants, moving at high speed._

Not that the ghost of Mainsbury Manor had thrown any potted plants at anyone so far. _She_ seemed to be a perfectly nice, perfectly well-behaved young gentlewoman who had had the misfortune of getting dead.

The same, sadly, could not be said of her sister's great-great-great-great grandson, who had apparently mistaken the term 'ghost hunter' for 'gullible sucker'.

_To be fair, it did take me a couple of days to catch on._

"Look," Julie yelled, "can we talk about this?"

A bullet buried itself in yet another probably priceless, possibly worthless ancient volume. Presumably, that meant 'no'.

_Clearly, this is not a guy who ever learned to use his words._ Julie was all for actions speaking louder than words, but there were limits.

"Just let me get out of here, and you'll never see or hear from me again." _On the other hand, you may hear from the police, MI-13 and the Ghost Hunters' Operative Undercover League, but hey, you shot first, so you totally asked for it._ "I promise."

No bullets. No sounds at all, in fact, which was bad news. _A quiet ghost is a ghost that's about to come through the wall behind you,_ as Laura always said.

Sadly, Julie didn't think Laura had ever imparted any wisdom on the topic of gun-wielding psychos.

It was tempting to peek around a corner to check if maybe she had a clear path to the exit. Running through a mansion, chased by a guy with a gun was not Julie's idea of a good time, but it was better than getting trapped in a library.

_People do that sort of stuff all the time in the movies, and they never get shot. Well, not as long as they're the good guys._ Julie was surely the good guy - _girl, woman, whatever_ in this situation.

She grabbed a book at random and stuck it out a bit. Only a blind person could have mistaken it for a human head, even in the poor light of the library - _or, actually, a blind person would not see it at all_ , but the fact that it remained unharmed made Julie feel confident enough to take a look for herself.

Reginald 'Nobody Calls Me 'Reggie', And I Will Thank You To Address Me as Mr' Mainsbury was standing by the window. A braver person might have toyed with the notion of taking a run and shoving him through it. A _dumber_ person might have actually tried it.

Julie did not have any illusions about her ability to push a grown man through a glass window while he tried to shoot her. True, the gun was lying on the ground, a few feet away, which was odd, unless he'd simply run out of bullets, in which case it was merely idiotic.

"Julie." Reginald smiled. It did not look horrible on him, just very out of place. _"Run."_

_Well. If you're going to put it like_ that _._

Julie ran.

 

_three days later_

The ghost's name was Rosemary Augusta 'Please Call Me Auggie' Mainsbury, and she was haunting a flower pot, which was unusual, but not unwelcome, given that nobody'd batted so much as an eye at Julie carrying it out of the mansion, once the nice detectives from the police had cleared it.

"Possession is a very serious thing," said Julie. "Of people, I mean."

Auggie finished watering the plants on the windowsill. Julie was sure that there had been fewer of them yesterday, and fewer still the day before.

She decided that she'd start worrying about it when the potted plants threatened to take over her bookshelves. _Those_ , she needed.

_"So I should only do it when saving your life?"_ Auggie asked. The sunlight was doing wonderfully distracting things to her hair, which should have been impossible, given that there was nothing physically there for sunlight to do anything to.

"Um." You could not kiss a ghost. You could hold your lips in the approximate place where a ghost's lips were and use your imagination, and that wasn't bad, but ... "I guess."

Auggie floated towards her. Through the coffee table, which might be symbolic of ... something-or-another, given what had happened on that coffee table. _Several times, even._

The toaster popped, even though it was not plugged in.

_"I was very happy to save your life,"_ said Auggie.

The radio switched on, and some lady who knew what she was talking about sang that she didn't want anybody else - _'cause when I think about you, I touch myself._

_Not quite what I had in mind,_ Julie thought, watching Auggie smile back at her, slowly and sweetly, and suggesting that people who claimed 19th century gentlewomen had all been dull and prim and proper had no idea what they were talking about.

_But close enough, I guess._


End file.
